DP Research Thread #6 (Even newer)

Thank you. One more thing though, after getting skill swapped, does Truant kick in the next turn or the one after that? Meaning, does the pokemon loaf around immediately after skill swapping Slaking?

EDIT: And the effects DP vs Platinum would be nice to know for this.

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Truant has a flag attached to it with two possible values: Loafing and NotLoafing. At the end of every round, the flag flips. It does not flip right before, during, or right after the Pokémon in question takes a turn. It flips at the end of every round during the end-of-turn effects.

If a Pokémon with Truant switches into battle in the middle of a turn, the flag is set to Loafing and therefore flips to NotLoafing for its first full turn in battle. If a Truant Pokémon is brought into battle between rounds to replace a KOed teammate, its flag will be set to NotLoafing for the next round. (So it'll be set differently depending on when in the round you flip the flag in the code you're writing.

If a Pokémon gains the Truant ability mid-round, their flag is immediately set to NotLoafing. So if they use Skill Swap to gain Truant, they will always loaf the following round. If they are given Truant by another Pokémon, they will always loaf on the next round.

So, just to be clear, if I have an Alakazam with Truant and I Skill Swap it onto a slower Victreebel, that Victreebel still gets to move this turn, but will loaf next turn. If I have the same Alakazam, but I Skill Swap Truant onto an Aerodactyl that's already taken its turn this round, it will loaf next turn.

Was that clear?

The only question that I have now is, does the flag reset to NotLoafing if a Pokémon uses Skill Swap and both it and its target have Truant?

EDIT: Yes, both flags reset when a Pokémon with Truant uses Skill Swap on another Pokémon with Truant.

Testing:
Slaking and Alakazam vs. Golduck
Both Slaking and Alakazam have Truant.

I'd also like to mention that during my testing with Acid Weather, when the Pokemon was fainted in sun it only activated Rain and Sandstorm. I am not sure if this was because it was in HG, but I thought I should mention it. And this is not Acid Weather, merely Sandstorm and Sandstorm Rain. Pokemon who are immune to Sandstorm still don't take damage. Pokemon who aren't immune will take the damage twice. And Rain is in effect for things like Swift Swim and Thunder.

For some reason Scizor wasn't taking Damage in Acid Weather. I don't think Acid Hail was up, so because it was immune to Sandstorm it got away with taking damage from Acid Rain and Acid Sun.

Also tested that Cherrim will keep switching between it's 2 forms if sun and rain are up. So does Castform. Note that these were tested in HGSS.

If one Pokemon is holding Quick Claw and it activates for this round (20% chance), or it is holding Custap Berry with the appropriate amount of HP remaining, it strikes before the other Pokemon. If this condition holds for both Pokemon, the one with the higher Speed strikes first; ties in Speed are broken at random.

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So in that case, if both items "activate", then the effects cancel out and the Pokemon's Speeds are used instead.

Admittedly it's a small sample size, and a larger sample size is needed to confirm (hence quick and dirty). But based on these results:

If only one parent holds the Everstone, that parent will be the one to pass down the nature (50% of the time or so).

If both parents hold an Everstone, you (seem to) have about 1/3 chance of passing the male's nature down, 1/3 chance of passing the female's nature down, and 1/3 chance of a random nature.

If you're so inclined, two parents with the same nature and both holding Everstones, you (seem to) have about a 2/3 chance of passing down the nature.

And I believe it was brought up earlier in the thread, but I've also seen a Female + Ditto pairing, with the Female holding the Everstone, pass down the Female's nature and not the Ditto's nature (across 5+ eggs out of 10 or so). This needs further testing as well.

Some more quick and dirty Everstone testing in HeartGold, using the same Magikarps as above plus a Timid-natured Ditto. I didn't test a Ditto holding an Everstone, as I've seen Dittos pass down natures pretty reliably.

I suspect the high number of Quiet natured offspring is due to a lucky streak, plus the small sample size. Barring that, maybe Female Pokemon are more likely to pass their nature down? Also I doubt the Ditto passed down its Timid nature, it was probably one of the random natures.

Aside from the small sample size, it seems fairly conclusive to me that it's whoever holds the Everstone that passes down their nature in HGSS. This is different than the EDP mechanism of passing down the Ditto's nature regardless of who holds the Everstone.

Start the game and find the initial RNG seed, and obtain the sequence of natures on eggs produced. If it skips natures in the sequence in order to force the egg to match the father's nature, then we know the Everstone works.

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1) Scizor eats Custap Berry with Bug Bite. Is its next move effected by Custap Berry?

2) Pokemon A has Custap Berry and under 25% health. Before it can activate, it is tricked away. Pokemon A then switches out before the Cutsap Berry Effect activates. Does it still have the Custap Berry effect next time it switches in?

3) [12:49pm] Super: Oh, and RBG, while you're testing, tell me what happens if a user goes second but not last with Custap Berry
[12:49pm] Super: Meaning Double Battles

Tri-Attack

Does Tri-Attack have a 20% chance of inflicting a status, or a 6.66% chance of inflicting each status? If the latter is true, then is it possible for multiple to be inflicted at the same time if healed by a berry?

How to test: Use Tri-Attack on Pokemon immune to 1 or 2 of it's effects (i.e. Magma Armor Fire Pokemon, Limber Fire Pokemon, Limber Ice Pokemon) and see what percent of the time status is inflicted.

1) My guess is that Custap Berry has no effect when it is consumed due to Bug Bite, since it doesn't work the same way as Oran Berry, Persim Berry, and the like, since it has no effect during the so-called "berry checks", but rather at the beginning of each round. I am not sure about this, though.

UPDATE: I was right. Custap Berry has no effect in that case.

2) When does "Pokemon A" begin to have 25% health? If it was at the beginning of the round, the Custap Berry had "activated" and will be consumed at the beginning of the holder's turn. Maybe the question is whether that item is consumed from the holder who caused the berry to activate.

UPDATE: I've discovered something interesting. When Trick is used on a Pokemon on the same round that a Pokemon's Custap Berry is activated, but before that Pokemon's turn, the game still displays the message "[Pokemon]'s [item] let it move first!" as that Pokemon's turn begins, where [item] is the Pokemon's new item after Trick was used. However, the Custap Berry itself is not consumed, since the Pokemon is no longer holding it. (This happens because the priority is determined just after all commands are chosen for the round.)

3) UPDATE: If the holder of Custap Berry strikes second or third but not last, the Custap Berry is still consumed.

Tri Attack:

My description for Tri Attack reads: "May either burn, freeze, or paralyze opponent." Thus Tri Attack can't cause more than one status problem simultaneously, but chooses one of the three.

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RBG:
2) When does "Pokemon A" begin to have 25% health? If it was at the beginning of the round, the Custap Berry had "activated" and will be consumed at the beginning of the holder's turn. Maybe the question is whether that item is consumed from the holder who caused the berry to activate.

UPDATE: I've discovered something interesting. When Trick is used on a Pokemon on the same round that a Pokemon's Custap Berry is activated, but before that Pokemon's turn, the game still displays the message "[Pokemon]'s [item] let it move first!" as that Pokemon's turn begins, where [item] is the Pokemon's new item after Trick was used. However, the Custap Berry itself is not consumed, since the Pokemon is no longer holding it. (This happens because the priority is determined just after all commands are chosen for the round.)

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That secondary effect of consuming an item that is not Custap Berry is already known. What I was asking for was this:

Pokemon A is holding Custap.
Pokemon A falls to below 25% health.
Pokemon B switches items with Pokemon A.
Pokemon A switches out before it can consume the item it is currently holding.
If Pokemon A reswitches in, does it still carry the Custap Berry Effect from earlier?

Also, another question. If Custap is knocked off after it's effect would be "triggered" via falling under 25% (Double Battle for example), does it's effect disappear as well? I ask this because it has already been discovered that the Custap user can consume "no item" if it has tricked no item by another Pokemon.

Tri Attack:

My description for Tri Attack reads: "May either burn, freeze, or paralyze opponent." Thus Tri Attack can't cause more than one status problem simultaneously, but chooses one of the three.

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In that case, what I would like to see tested is that if a Pokemon has an immunity to one or more of the status conditions, does it still have a 20% chance of a status being inflicted on it?

Think of it this way: Tri Attack has a 20% chance of doing the following: "The game chooses burned, frozen, or paralyzed. The opponent now has that status problem." If the opponent would be immune to the status problem chosen, nothing happens. The game doesn't go back and choose a different status problem to try. Another consequence of this is that, for example, a Pokemon that can't be burned can still be frozen or paralyzed with Tri Attack (if the game chose "frozen" or "paralyzed" respectively).

I used Tri Attack on Magma Armor Magcargo 20 times, and Magcargo was only Paralyzed once. This supports poccil's theory. The game doesn't "fill in" the 20% chance of status with whatever status the opponent is affected by, so the chance of Magcargo being Paralyzed was only 6.67% rather than 20%.

Also, when you battle a wild Pokemon and your active Pokemon is holding a Smoke Ball, you will always be able to escape when your Pokemon faints and the "Use next Pokemon?" message appears. However, instead of saying your Pokemon fled with its Smoke Ball, the game just says "Got away safely!"

I'm also getting a similar result to Poccil - the Custap effect is still carried out despite not having a custap berry when Tricked

EDIT: oh, if it switches out, it does not retain its Custap effect.

What I did was this;
Custap Salamence vs Slowbro
Salamence used Double Edge! (health bar goes red)
Slowbro used Trick
Salamence switched out then switched back in.
Slowbro switches for Jolteon.
No mention of Custap as Salamence attepts to Draco Meteor (but gets Tboled by Jolteon)

as for

Also, another question. If Custap is knocked off after it's effect would be "triggered" via falling under 25% (Double Battle for example), does it's effect disappear as well? I ask this because it has already been discovered that the Custap user can consume "no item" if it has tricked no item by another Pokemon.

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I Knock Offed a Custap holder, and Custap was not consumed and the effect did not take place.

Test #2 would actually suggest that it picks a random opponent and boosts based off that, assuming Shuckle in test #2 has more Special Defense than Defense. It actually rules out the "add both up and pick the lower" explanation, because Gliscor's higher Defense should cause Special Attack to be raised. This would also be more consistent with most other mechanics in 2v2.

I used Tri Attack on Magma Armor Magcargo 20 times, and Magcargo was only Paralyzed once. This supports poccil's theory. The game doesn't "fill in" the 20% chance of status with whatever status the opponent is affected by, so the chance of Magcargo being Paralyzed was only 6.67% rather than 20%.

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We still need tests with a Lum Berry to see if multiple statuses can be triggered in one turn. Your test proves that it doesn't do "20% chance to status, and then go in a loop until we find a legal status", but of course then you'd crash the game against a Magma Armor Camerupt! However, there are still possible implementations that would lead to something along the lines of:

I still stand by my take on how Tri Attack works. Tri Attack just has an unusual additional effect unlike ThunderShock, Ember, or Blizzard. The additional effect, again, is "The game chooses burned, frozen, or paralyzed. The opponent now has that status problem." rather than just "The opponent is paralyzed" (ThunderShock) or "The opponent is badly poisoned" (Poison Fang), and definitely not "The game chooses burned, frozen, or paralyzed. The opponent now has that status problem. If it doesn't, repeat this process until the opponent has a status problem." Again, the game doesn't go back if the opponent can't have the chosen status problem or if the opponent's status problem is cured immediately afterwards.

Edited: Here's additional proof that Tri Attack doesn't go back according to the mechanic you mentioned above. The timing shows that additional effects are processed, then ability effects, then item effects. Here's one attack sequence I discovered:

As you can see, Kecleon is affected by an additional effect, an ability effect, and an item effect. The additional effect was already fully processed before the ability effect and item effect.
(This example will be apparent only if Kecleon's type was other than Normal.)

I have a double battle question. For moves where you attack one opponent but do not select which opponent gets hit (Outrage, for example), is the odds of each opponent being targeted equal? It might seem obvious to say yes, but I remember AI behavior during my Colosseum speedrun preferring to attack the opposite corner opponent. I do not know if that is just AI behaviour though or if the odds are biased to selecting one opponent over the other.

I don't know if anyone's noted this, but Curse targets the opponent's Pokemon, even if the Pokemon using Curse isn't a Ghost-type. So if the Curse user is slower, and there isn't a Pokemon on the field when by the time the Curse-user uses the move (if the opponent used Selfdestruct, Explosion, Memento, or KO'd itself with recoil damage), then Curse will say "But there was no target...," and will fail to lower the user's Speed or increase its Attack or Defense. I learned this in the Battle Tower when I used Memento on the turn that the opponent tried to use Curse. I guess the move selects a target, checks for the target, then does a type check of the user (Ghost or non-Ghost), and chooses which effect to implement based on the user's type if there's still a target there.

I had previously known this. That's because Curse has a target of "single non-user" regardless of whether the user is a Ghost type. My attack description reads in part:

If user's current type does not include Ghost or if user has Magic Guard, [modifies user's stats]. Otherwise, user loses half of total HP ... and at the end of every round, opponent loses 1/4 of total HP. ... Fails either way if no target exists.

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By the way, Memento, Selfdestruct, and Explosion will also do nothing if no target exists as they're used:

Memento -- User faints as part of this attack's use. Decreases opponent's Attack and Special Attack by 2 stages. Fails if there is no target (doesn't cause fainting).
Selfdestruct/Explosion -- User faints as part of this attack's use. Opponent's Defense is temporarily halved in damage calculation. Fails if no target exists (doesn't cause fainting).

Jack of All Trades

I am playing through Soul Silver with a Soundproof Whismur and it was just hit twice by Voltorb's SonicBoom. According to the Smogon page, Whismur should have been unaffected. If both Pokémon have Soundproof is the effect canceled out or is the description on Smogon's page wrong?

EDIT:

fat Bulbapedia said:

Soundproof prevents all effect from sound moves, granting the user immunity from them. Also, a sleeping Pokémon with this ability cannot be awakened with a Poké Flute in FireRed and LeafGreen.

The quote I gave for Curse is the effect of the attack. When a Pokemon tries to use a move, the game determines the move's possible targets by checking the move's "target value" to determine what targets the move has. Only after there is at least one target does the game carry out the attack's effect. Thus, even if the attack's effect had instead read as follows:

If user's current type includes Ghost ..., user loses half of total HP ... and at the end of every round, opponent loses 1/4 of total HP. Otherwise, [modifies user's stats] ... Fails either way if no target exists.

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the result would still have been the same. Since the chosen target no longer exists, the game never carries out Curse's effect and therefore never reaches a type check.